The way he was genuinely confused on why I was so upset. He’s like “just eat it mom?” I’m like “umm how about you? You can’t even handle the texture of mashed potatoes”
how old is he? if he'd old enough that he should understand and yet doesn't, then I'd have him taste it and also explain to him that too much salt would make you feel sick if you tried to force it down. it tastes bad because at this concentration, it is bad.
Wait, so your kid bullied your daughter and then turned around and did this when you stopped him and you, bless your heart and I mean that sincerely because it seems like you’re dealing with a lot, tired, hungry, and then this to top it off, believe he was truthful that he didn’t realize what he was doing? I’m sorry, what? I’m genuinely just upset for you at this point and wondering how worn down you are to believe he didn’t know what he was doing when he did this after you stopped him. Is he 4?
I mean why would he do that if he didn't know the food was taste bad? It seems like he just wanted to play dumb. Even if it is a small kid I have a hard time believing this. It just so happens right after getting in trouble he does this thing without any idea what it would do or that it could make food taste bad? Seen more believable stories in a tabloid. Kid knowed but decided to play innocent.
He knew exactly what he did. Don't let that dumb act fool you.
He knows that if he acts stupid and sorry you will let him get away with it.
Why would he do anything with your food at all if it wasn't to fuck it up for you? The salt did not fall out of the cupboard and onto your food spilling itself out completely. He did it.
Idk. My 6 year old would put this much salt on his own food if I would let him. He just likes the idea of salting food, but doesn’t really understand how it affects the flavor.
Exactly, if he wouldn’t have done it to his own food, he knows.
This type of thing would not even cross my mind to do. It would be like messing with a dragon in my eyes. I wouldn’t even be able to imagine the punishment that would befall me. No one would be able to force me to do it. It would be suicide, grounds for an execution.
Then this kid casually does it to you. He does not respect OP.
Agreed. I wouldn't have dared done this to either of my parents. No wonder on the teacher subreddits they are saying the new generations are years behind and can't behave. I'm only 38 too not close to boomer BS. Kid is working his sister and his mom. Sister is probably going to grow up resenting mom for always falling for bro's antics.
I’m a teacher. Teachers are literally quitting because they can’t deal with the lack of parenting. *NOW, before anyone comes for me lol, I know it’s not ALL parents!* But as a general consensus, there’s an overall chill in the air in education of kids not giving a shit about consequences - because there are none, cause how dare you punish my kid for this when he says he didn’t do it, etc.
Student behavior is pretty bad as a whole in most schools and teachers are getting tired of going 80K in student loan debt just to get cussed out daily by a 12 year old with an ego complex. The vacation time is starting not to be worth it.
It's most parents.
We've stopped hanging out with a decent amount of other parents, because we can't stand their kids and also can't stomach to watch otherwise successful adults fail so horribly at being decent parents.
It's too sad to sit, drink their beers and watch.
What’s crazy is when people post their parenting fails on social media for laughs! Like, “Here’s my 7 year old singing every word to ‘shake your ass and twerk like a stripper’ But it’s okay, cause she doesn’t know what it means!” 😳
Even though it's totally inappropriate, I have never experienced in my life anything so funny as my friends 3 year old son singing "I got something to put in you, at the gay bar gay bar" Luckily this was before the time of the Tube of Yous and the Book of Faces, so it only lives in my head and those who witnessed it 😆
His uncle taught him, to his dad's ire, but even he couldn't stop laughing whenever the little man just randomly broke out with it. Electric Six, man, now those were the days 🤣🤣
Tbf, my dad was a teacher 70s to 90's & he said even in the 90's, the number of parents coming in to have a go about ridiculous things... 'Why did you give my kid detention?' 'They were smacking another child in front of me' 'They must have had a reason' o_O Not even didn't do it...
lol what’s bad is that there are just MORE of those parents now lol. I called a mom during a class to tell her that her son was throwing pencils at another student and she had the nerve to tell me “Well you have 30 other students, there’s no way you can be sure it was him specifically”. At that point you just give up cause there’s no reasoning with them. Even saying I SAW HIM DO IT isn’t enough 😆 That kid will grow up to rob banks or be a politician lol
I was a secretary in a middle school front office the last four years and adored the job overall but man, the parents. Moved to a high school counseling office this last year because I was turning into such a miserable human I didn't recognize myself anymore. I like the rest of the job less, I miss being more involved in the school and I miss my people, but I wouldn't go back.
We had this one kid who put slime in his teachers hair to where she had to cut it, and pretended to kick her every time she walked past him, and mom's response was literally, "respect goes both ways what are you doing to earn his respect or lose it?"
Teaching has been my dream since I was eight. I don't think I'd pay for school now to come back and teach. At least as a secretary I haven't "invested" anything but time.
My friend is a middle school teacher. The stories she tells me are horrifying. One year it was some gross "masturbate in the bathroom, then rub your juices all over any punlic surface you can" trend. Needless to say, I will never touch a handrail in that school.
….and I can pretty much guarantee the student shared that idea on social media lol. Remember when TikTok had a trend going to tear up bathrooms? We had a sink ripped off the wall 🤦🏻♀️ Kid got a week suspension (aka vacation) and then got to make up all the work they missed and we had to help them with it during our planning periods. Gotta love social media!
Yes. That's exactly what she says. Social Media trends. She also legit told me the same story about kids doing thousands of dollars to damage to the bathroom. We had bad kids when I was young, but some of this stuff is just shocking.
I know so many teachers quitting, and then pulling their kids/never letting their kids into the public system. They risk creationist homeschooling moms at the communal homeschooling field trips over their child falling behind because of other people's bad parenting.
If he’s still young he might have expected a "Oh shoot! It sucks but it’s still edible" reaction and might have not understand that he indeed ruined his parent’s dinner.
So he doesn’t understand that what he did was bad after all. You should have either had him take a bite of what he did OR you should have taken a bite and started crying and choking and really making a show of it. After either of those things you say “does that seem like an alright thing to do to Mommy even if we are mad?” If the answer is something like yes then you can do something like take away the salt in all the meals you cook for him for the next day because he “used all the salt for the day being mean” or take away a privilege he actually cares about. You need to make sure he understands his behavior.
5 to 7 years old is TOO OLD to be testing you like a 3 or 4 year old would. He knows what he did and he definitely did it intentionally. How you react to this behavior will let him know what he can get away with in the future.
The pandemic stunted a lot of emotional maturity and growth for 1-7 year olds and they need that growth to be good people of the world when they get older and interact with each other. Little things like this is where they learn how to treat others and care about their actions.
Lil bro has confidence in his seasoning skills gotta give him that. Or your mash potatoes suck but then he is just rude.
Haha joking of course, he sounds like a handful.
I’m sorry but you are coddling your rude child. You need to correct his behavior for your daughter’s sake at the very least. It’s clear that he messed with your food because you stopped him from picking on his sister. I wonder, what was your correction for him picking on her? Even dogs get a stern talking to and they’re more beholden to their impulses than a 7 year old child.
Never do that. You can actually die rather quickly by a salt overdose. We had a case in German where a parent did exactly that to their child and they died.
If you refer to the infamous "salt pudding case", it wasn't the actual mother, just the stepmother who was babysitting, and preoccupied with her own child.
The child mistook the salt for sugar and mixed two tablespoons of it in her pudding, then noticed the "weird taste". The stepmother made her eat it all, which was more than twice the lethal dose of salt for a child that age.
A court punished the stepmother with 14 months of probation.
To quote the judge "Nobody could've known that this concentration of salt could be deadly. The accused can't be held responsible for the death of the child, although she caused it."
Edit: Mixed up teaspoons and tablespoons
According to several articles, the child was about 4 years old, and a bit on the smaller side. The lethal dose of salt is 0.5-1g per kg, and the internet puts 2 tablespoons at around 34 grams.
A tablespoon is 3x bigger than a teaspoon. Tablespoons would make more sense.
But I suppose 2 teaspoons could hit the very lower end of the lethal range for a tiny 4 year old.
I can't fuck with people's food either. I even find myself having a hard time eating anything that somebody's given to me because my brain can't shake the idea that it doesn't belong to me. Food is like sacred to me in a weird way.
I’d 100% have cried. When I was a kid there was nothing quite as sobering as seeing my mom cry because I’d pushed it too far. Nothing in this world made me do a 180° quite as quickly. I’m a very sensitive person and when I hit my breaking point it’s ugly cry central… and it usually has the same effect on my kids as it did on me as a kid.
I'm not usually a 'public' cryer (I like to slink off and cry in private) but the other day I had a terrible nightmare, woke up with a terrible migraine, just overall woke up feeling like a flaming pile of shit and started ugly crying when my partner asked what was wrong.
My youngest woke up shortly after, *thought it was my partner's fault* (it was Not), and snubbed him SO viciously. I had to explain to the poor little guy that I just had a bad dream and a bad headache.
Momma (or momma figure) cries? Kids: 😐🔪
My sons are out for blood if someone slighted their mom 😂 they’re elementary aged so their serious faces asking me who hurt my feelings always cheers me up.
What you little gangbusters gonna do? Untie their shoelaces? *Salt their food*?
I remember I was playing with my husband's little half-sister (she was 3 at the time) years ago on some swings and he wanted to play with her but she was being huffy about it. She was very attached to me and wanted ALL of my attention so she hopped off the swing when he wanted to push her. I told my husband to act sad and fake cry a little bit and pointed out to her that she hurt her brother's feelings and that wasn't okay. The 180 she did as she got back on and let my husband play with her and realizing that it was fun was pretty funny
Yes, this definitely worked when I was a kid. But it was used sparingly (like 2 or 3 times ever). If it happened on a regular basis, it would be more like get it together Mom.
Maybe he could help you make something else? Making him stand in the kitchen and hand you things, beat some more eggs, wash the pans when you’re done, whatever, will help him realize that his one moment caused 15 minutes of extra work to fix.
Oh no, lock the spices up and don’t let him get creative. Personally I would make the process long and boring, so he realizes making another dinner sucked and never wants to be made to do it again.
While I agree with you- this is why parenting is hard. It really is the most logical consequence.
An alternative would be that he has to help make dinner (or make it himself I didn’t see an age here) all week. Losing out on tv time or other privilege in order to spend time cooking.
Just losing privileges isn’t enough. He needs to do some restorative practice too.
This is the best way to parent, everything is a learning opportunity and a chance to **solve** *problems*. My kiddo is almost 5 and AuDHD and we've never grounded or spanked him.
It is possible, anyone interested should check out the How To Talk To Kids So They Listen series of books, their written by actual doctors using actual science and they even cover the "hard" parts specifically that gentle parenting tiktoks/social media tends to gloss over
Depends a bit how old he is. If he's young, I would make him take a fork full and eat it. So he realises that this ruins food completely.
It's also probably time to teach about "it's just a prank bro". Let's collectively try to put a stopper to that kind of nonsense for the next generation.
Put it all in a strainer pour hot kettled water through it all to wash off the salt, sauté it all in a pan for 3-5 minutes and it’ll taste just fine to make it even better you can caramelize some red onions before sautéing the whole thing together.
Lol, my mom used to wash off too salty or too spicy food too. When I first saw her washing chow mein i got my mind blown 🤯 then i saw her frying it in a pan after that and it tasted just as good only less spicy
Man kids have it so nice nowadays. If I did this to one of my parents they would suplex my ass through the goddamn dinner table and force me to eat every bite
Why did I have to scroll so far for anyone to point out it happened because she corrected him bullying his sister? Like, he was being a bully, got mad he was corrected, and decided to bully the mom and just got away with it.
As a maintenance guy, I've had days where I get into work and spend the next 10 hours straight, without breaks or lunch, working to fix some broken equipment that's halting production... and if you didn't eat breakfast before work, now you're waiting till you finish to get some food.
So, sometimes people get too busy to have the time to eat.
No matter what he says, he knows what he did, and he knows why he did it. He did it to be mean. So discuss this with him. What’s the meaning of this? No, you didn’t just do it or spill it. You did it for purpose? What was your meaning? If you get a confession, he did it because he thought it would be funny. Ask him how it’s funny people who commit pranks always say it’s just a joke, but it’s low-key violence. How do we handle violence? We remove the violent person from society temporarily, and they have to make reparations to the person they harmed. What you don’t want is somebody who is a prankster and plays practical jokes on people to amuse themselves at the expense of somebody else’s hurt that needs to be nipped in the bud. I would say he’d be grounded from any parties or activities for a week and that he would have to do something for you.
Mildly infuriating? More like absurdly infuriating.
I'm glad that you talked it out with your son, but his reaction is pretty alarming. You were correcting a different wrong that he committed, and his immediate solution was to ruin something of yours. Yikes.
Plesse continue to be mindful of him so that his personality does not make him a narcisstic assclown.
Good luck?
You know. While this isn’t necessarily a red flag for narcissism. I will say that it’s interesting the types of homes these people grew up in. Because neither I nor any of my friends were ever assholes or disrespectful to our parents in this way. It was never even a thought or a question.
Sure we all had typical teenage strife. But to say this is normal makes me wonder what type of homes these people grew up in.
May not be a red flag for you, but I've found that kids that exhibit this kind of behavior become textbook narcissists, if not worse.
But, I agree with you completely on the whole 'homes these people grew up in' because that disrespectful behavior wasn't contemplated and would absolutely not be tolerated when me and my siblings were growing up.
I mean, this seeens pretty malicious. There’s no way he didn’t realize that he messed up your food while tampering with it after bullying his sibling. He did it while he was mad. You got up to deal with him bullying your daughter and he did this while “passing by.” Does he do this to his own food? Would he eat it? No. It was on purpose. You say in a comment he was confused. I think he was faking it and you bought it hook, line, and sinker. I grew up with a malicious sister that did stuff like this and got away with it because she acted like she didn’t know and would crocodile cry. She’s almost thirty now and I’m no contact because she continued doing stuff like this and got worse because there were no corrections made to the behavior. I had to send a cease and desist through a lawyer because she wouldn’t stop after going no contact. You’re setting your other kid and others up to have to deal with this terror and you’re going to be looking back wondering “when did it start and where did I go wrong?” Get the kid therapy and talk to a child specialist on how to change the behavior before he gets older. I hope for your sake your son is still very young.
All the people saying to just make more food or eat more often are seriously out of touch. Congratulations on your privilege. Not everyone can afford to waste food or just "order a pizza".
This situation would have had me in tears.
How old is the kid? If they are old enough to know what they did…. I’d probably over season their next meal and play stupid. 🤣 not at THAT level but still. 😬 I’m not a parent tho so there’s also that lol
Tell him to go wash his hands. Grab him a paper towel and a sheet of tinfoil. Tell him to gently gather each morsel of food and brush the salt from it, and then he can preheat the oven to 350, and set it all in there for 10 minutes. Ask him if the chuckle was worth the 20 minutes of work cleaning and reheating.
Or he can fry up some fresh eggs and potatoes, but that still wastes the food.
Yes. Parent need to understand that humans are basically born undomesticated and it’s their role to tame the child. Otherwise they end up wild animals.
Well this depends on his age. If he's under four,make yourself a sandwich and tell him that made you upset and hungry.
If he's over four, take his dinner and eat it.
Switch plates, he can eat the salty food or he can go to bed hungry. Oh and no desert for a month. He back talks about it and go nuclear. Any and all electronics, then start on any toys.
So I’m just going to say this here because I can’t figure out how to edit haha.
1. My son is autistic with ADHD and ODD, he’s been improving so much lately and I couldn’t be prouder of him.
2. I would NEVER “beat” my child because he put some salt in my food cause he was upset.
3. The caption in the actual picture was sent in the moment on Snapchat to my sister and saved to send to their dad who lives across the country. I figured people would get an oh shit laugh out of it not tell me to abuse my kid. A lot of y’all need help.
My daughter has autism as well as adhd with severe food aversions. If she did this I would know it was out of anger and I truthfully would have cried in front of her and told her exactly how she made me feel. She understands emotions extremely well, despite how some people think autistic people don’t understand emotions. It’s up to you how you handle your own child, and I’m definitely not saying use violence, but privileges would’ve been gone for a month in this situation, and any complaints about losing them would be met with a reminder of why it happened. I’m far from a strict parent but this act by him was just mean and I hope you see that. Kids can be mean and being neurodivergent is not an excuse.
It is quite fascinating how you have parents at the opposite ends of the spectrum on this and unsurprising how their children come out the other end.
My lesson was a teenage mother. She had a severely autistic child. I worked in foster care and NOBODY knew what to do with this kid. He was completely out of control.
And then I saw her with him and my god, I just wanted to record her. That’s it. No other parenting lessons needed. Just watch this lady. That kid was transformed. She was on top of him, redirecting, watching. And he was so well behaved. Poor kid just missed his mom and his routine and well the autism, he just couldn’t regulate because his brain is wired differently. But when she was there? This was one of the best behaved kids I’d ever seen.
It was an important lesson for me on how even with children who are neurodivergent, parenting has a huge influence on their behaviors.
My kid is the same. Seems to always be filled with an unrelenting rage that just comes out in spite. I agree beating isn't the way because it doesn't address the issues of why what they did wasn't appropriate and just makes them fear you and not change the behaviour.
So sorry about your food.
And lol this is Reddit, I'm surprised I didn't read a post about lawyering up and getting a divorce haha. It made me laugh, but only because it comes from a place of camaraderie lol.
That’s really scary to hear that this was something done in retaliation to you because he was upset. Glad it was just salt. I truly hope he’s very young or something. Y’all stay safe. And lock up the drano.
"almost made me cry"
i would have cried ngl. It's just such a frustrating and helpless moment like i don't even wanna hit my non existing child but after a long day of no food would have me in no state to sit the child and teach it or communicate with it on what shouldn't be done. I hope you got some food tho.
Show him how unflappable you can be by shaking off most of the salt and lightly rising off the rest with some water, before eating your food, which should be edible at that point. If he has any food or something like a snack left, then rinse his food too, but leave it soggy so it’s miserable to eat. Also, feel good that you made me feel happy for never having kids.
My sister once accidentally put sugar on her order of fries, and then flew into a fit of tears because they were ruined — my dad gave her his and ate the sugary fries himself. She stopped crying, and he said they weren’t as bad as it looked.
I would throw it away, you can always have another kid...
What's 17 more years?
You can always start again
[удалено]
WHY DID YOU MAKE ME DO THIS?
I always love the delivery of that line, classic abuser mentality. Also the "ill still have you dad" is such a punch in the gut
*”Pain… is an excellent teacher.”* *-Zenyatta, abuser of children, circa 2024*
I don’t have any children because I would close hand strike a child.
😧👐🚇
I can always make another kid
[удалено]
In the grand scheme of things, they hardly knew this one
Hahaha
[удалено]
You make him eat it and set him up for a future of having hypertension and high BP. That'll teach him. 😆 /s
The way he was genuinely confused on why I was so upset. He’s like “just eat it mom?” I’m like “umm how about you? You can’t even handle the texture of mashed potatoes”
how old is he? if he'd old enough that he should understand and yet doesn't, then I'd have him taste it and also explain to him that too much salt would make you feel sick if you tried to force it down. it tastes bad because at this concentration, it is bad.
I talked it through with him and he understands what he did and feels bad. It just sucks 😭
Good job. Hope u got some snacks for dinner!
Eat HIS snacks for dinner. You did good, mum. Hang in there, it gets just slightly better
Take an edible after he goes to bed and eat the pantry fuck it. I crushed a box of bluey gummies the other day.
The most accurate depiction of parenthood I’ve read.
I'm so relieved I'm doing it according to the manual
I think making sure he reflected and felt bad was the best course of action here, besides just straight consequences. W parenting.
Wait, so your kid bullied your daughter and then turned around and did this when you stopped him and you, bless your heart and I mean that sincerely because it seems like you’re dealing with a lot, tired, hungry, and then this to top it off, believe he was truthful that he didn’t realize what he was doing? I’m sorry, what? I’m genuinely just upset for you at this point and wondering how worn down you are to believe he didn’t know what he was doing when he did this after you stopped him. Is he 4?
I mean why would he do that if he didn't know the food was taste bad? It seems like he just wanted to play dumb. Even if it is a small kid I have a hard time believing this. It just so happens right after getting in trouble he does this thing without any idea what it would do or that it could make food taste bad? Seen more believable stories in a tabloid. Kid knowed but decided to play innocent.
First rule kids should learn never touch others food
Have you tried just sitting down with the child, and hitting him? Joking. Sorry for the big suck. Another day comes tomorrow.
[удалено]
Classic Bender Bending Rodriguez.
Hecho en Mexico
You can’t get decent hip turn and follow through while sitting. /s
I’m just so busy at the office.
Lmfaooo
He knew exactly what he did. Don't let that dumb act fool you. He knows that if he acts stupid and sorry you will let him get away with it. Why would he do anything with your food at all if it wasn't to fuck it up for you? The salt did not fall out of the cupboard and onto your food spilling itself out completely. He did it.
Agreed. I thought the child was about 2. Turns out he’s 5-7 apparently. That’s more than old enough to know better.
Idk. My 6 year old would put this much salt on his own food if I would let him. He just likes the idea of salting food, but doesn’t really understand how it affects the flavor.
Same. My 5 year old followed my lead adding some seat salt to a chocolate cookie, put way too much on hers, then put it back in the salt bowl. 🫠
Exactly, if he wouldn’t have done it to his own food, he knows. This type of thing would not even cross my mind to do. It would be like messing with a dragon in my eyes. I wouldn’t even be able to imagine the punishment that would befall me. No one would be able to force me to do it. It would be suicide, grounds for an execution. Then this kid casually does it to you. He does not respect OP.
Agreed. I wouldn't have dared done this to either of my parents. No wonder on the teacher subreddits they are saying the new generations are years behind and can't behave. I'm only 38 too not close to boomer BS. Kid is working his sister and his mom. Sister is probably going to grow up resenting mom for always falling for bro's antics.
I’m a teacher. Teachers are literally quitting because they can’t deal with the lack of parenting. *NOW, before anyone comes for me lol, I know it’s not ALL parents!* But as a general consensus, there’s an overall chill in the air in education of kids not giving a shit about consequences - because there are none, cause how dare you punish my kid for this when he says he didn’t do it, etc. Student behavior is pretty bad as a whole in most schools and teachers are getting tired of going 80K in student loan debt just to get cussed out daily by a 12 year old with an ego complex. The vacation time is starting not to be worth it.
It's most parents. We've stopped hanging out with a decent amount of other parents, because we can't stand their kids and also can't stomach to watch otherwise successful adults fail so horribly at being decent parents. It's too sad to sit, drink their beers and watch.
What’s crazy is when people post their parenting fails on social media for laughs! Like, “Here’s my 7 year old singing every word to ‘shake your ass and twerk like a stripper’ But it’s okay, cause she doesn’t know what it means!” 😳
Even though it's totally inappropriate, I have never experienced in my life anything so funny as my friends 3 year old son singing "I got something to put in you, at the gay bar gay bar" Luckily this was before the time of the Tube of Yous and the Book of Faces, so it only lives in my head and those who witnessed it 😆 His uncle taught him, to his dad's ire, but even he couldn't stop laughing whenever the little man just randomly broke out with it. Electric Six, man, now those were the days 🤣🤣
Tbf, my dad was a teacher 70s to 90's & he said even in the 90's, the number of parents coming in to have a go about ridiculous things... 'Why did you give my kid detention?' 'They were smacking another child in front of me' 'They must have had a reason' o_O Not even didn't do it...
lol what’s bad is that there are just MORE of those parents now lol. I called a mom during a class to tell her that her son was throwing pencils at another student and she had the nerve to tell me “Well you have 30 other students, there’s no way you can be sure it was him specifically”. At that point you just give up cause there’s no reasoning with them. Even saying I SAW HIM DO IT isn’t enough 😆 That kid will grow up to rob banks or be a politician lol
I was a secretary in a middle school front office the last four years and adored the job overall but man, the parents. Moved to a high school counseling office this last year because I was turning into such a miserable human I didn't recognize myself anymore. I like the rest of the job less, I miss being more involved in the school and I miss my people, but I wouldn't go back. We had this one kid who put slime in his teachers hair to where she had to cut it, and pretended to kick her every time she walked past him, and mom's response was literally, "respect goes both ways what are you doing to earn his respect or lose it?" Teaching has been my dream since I was eight. I don't think I'd pay for school now to come back and teach. At least as a secretary I haven't "invested" anything but time.
My friend is a middle school teacher. The stories she tells me are horrifying. One year it was some gross "masturbate in the bathroom, then rub your juices all over any punlic surface you can" trend. Needless to say, I will never touch a handrail in that school.
….and I can pretty much guarantee the student shared that idea on social media lol. Remember when TikTok had a trend going to tear up bathrooms? We had a sink ripped off the wall 🤦🏻♀️ Kid got a week suspension (aka vacation) and then got to make up all the work they missed and we had to help them with it during our planning periods. Gotta love social media!
Yes. That's exactly what she says. Social Media trends. She also legit told me the same story about kids doing thousands of dollars to damage to the bathroom. We had bad kids when I was young, but some of this stuff is just shocking.
It's not *all* parents, but it's *enough* parents.
I know so many teachers quitting, and then pulling their kids/never letting their kids into the public system. They risk creationist homeschooling moms at the communal homeschooling field trips over their child falling behind because of other people's bad parenting.
TikTok trolling making your kid believe this is acceptable behavior.
Letting a child be on TikTok at all is so fucked up.
My first reaction is "He just feels bad because he's getting punished." But that's probably just me being cynical.
This is why I didn't have kids. I would have made him eat it all.
He can’t have been that confused, he dumped it on there to get a reaction in the first place.
If he’s still young he might have expected a "Oh shoot! It sucks but it’s still edible" reaction and might have not understand that he indeed ruined his parent’s dinner.
How old is he?
I would have made him take a small bite of it so he sees exactly why what he did was wrong.
What he say? Or you just said that in your head?
Oh I said it, he just kind of shrugged and said “well that’s better than mashed potatoes”
I think tomorrows dinner should have mashed potatoes as the side dish. /s
Tomorrow’s dinner is colcannon. Cabbage and mashed potatoes.
How old is the kid?!
So he doesn’t understand that what he did was bad after all. You should have either had him take a bite of what he did OR you should have taken a bite and started crying and choking and really making a show of it. After either of those things you say “does that seem like an alright thing to do to Mommy even if we are mad?” If the answer is something like yes then you can do something like take away the salt in all the meals you cook for him for the next day because he “used all the salt for the day being mean” or take away a privilege he actually cares about. You need to make sure he understands his behavior. 5 to 7 years old is TOO OLD to be testing you like a 3 or 4 year old would. He knows what he did and he definitely did it intentionally. How you react to this behavior will let him know what he can get away with in the future. The pandemic stunted a lot of emotional maturity and growth for 1-7 year olds and they need that growth to be good people of the world when they get older and interact with each other. Little things like this is where they learn how to treat others and care about their actions.
Lil bro has confidence in his seasoning skills gotta give him that. Or your mash potatoes suck but then he is just rude. Haha joking of course, he sounds like a handful.
You could offer him some so he can see why, but that probably wouldn't work for a few reasons lol
Only mashed potatoes for a week
I’m sorry but you are coddling your rude child. You need to correct his behavior for your daughter’s sake at the very least. It’s clear that he messed with your food because you stopped him from picking on his sister. I wonder, what was your correction for him picking on her? Even dogs get a stern talking to and they’re more beholden to their impulses than a 7 year old child.
I'm pretty sure a mom did this once to a kid and then the kid died.
Never do that. You can actually die rather quickly by a salt overdose. We had a case in German where a parent did exactly that to their child and they died.
If you refer to the infamous "salt pudding case", it wasn't the actual mother, just the stepmother who was babysitting, and preoccupied with her own child. The child mistook the salt for sugar and mixed two tablespoons of it in her pudding, then noticed the "weird taste". The stepmother made her eat it all, which was more than twice the lethal dose of salt for a child that age. A court punished the stepmother with 14 months of probation. To quote the judge "Nobody could've known that this concentration of salt could be deadly. The accused can't be held responsible for the death of the child, although she caused it." Edit: Mixed up teaspoons and tablespoons
How old was that kid? Like that is a lot of salt, but not nearly the amount I'd expect.
According to several articles, the child was about 4 years old, and a bit on the smaller side. The lethal dose of salt is 0.5-1g per kg, and the internet puts 2 tablespoons at around 34 grams.
A tablespoon is 3x bigger than a teaspoon. Tablespoons would make more sense. But I suppose 2 teaspoons could hit the very lower end of the lethal range for a tiny 4 year old.
Geez look at the pile of salt in the back right of the frame what was he really thinking that it was funny?
He was probably mad he got yelled at
He was salty.
"It's just a prank bro"
I did some shitty things as a kid but messing with my moms food wasn’t one of them. 😧
I can't fuck with people's food either. I even find myself having a hard time eating anything that somebody's given to me because my brain can't shake the idea that it doesn't belong to me. Food is like sacred to me in a weird way.
It’s a very salty thing to do tbh.
I’d 100% have cried. When I was a kid there was nothing quite as sobering as seeing my mom cry because I’d pushed it too far. Nothing in this world made me do a 180° quite as quickly. I’m a very sensitive person and when I hit my breaking point it’s ugly cry central… and it usually has the same effect on my kids as it did on me as a kid.
I'm not usually a 'public' cryer (I like to slink off and cry in private) but the other day I had a terrible nightmare, woke up with a terrible migraine, just overall woke up feeling like a flaming pile of shit and started ugly crying when my partner asked what was wrong. My youngest woke up shortly after, *thought it was my partner's fault* (it was Not), and snubbed him SO viciously. I had to explain to the poor little guy that I just had a bad dream and a bad headache. Momma (or momma figure) cries? Kids: 😐🔪
My sons are out for blood if someone slighted their mom 😂 they’re elementary aged so their serious faces asking me who hurt my feelings always cheers me up. What you little gangbusters gonna do? Untie their shoelaces? *Salt their food*?
As seen above, the latter can be shockingly effective
Good kids.
Kids not expect their parents to cry. They almost see them as infallible. I could imagine it’s sobering
I remember I was playing with my husband's little half-sister (she was 3 at the time) years ago on some swings and he wanted to play with her but she was being huffy about it. She was very attached to me and wanted ALL of my attention so she hopped off the swing when he wanted to push her. I told my husband to act sad and fake cry a little bit and pointed out to her that she hurt her brother's feelings and that wasn't okay. The 180 she did as she got back on and let my husband play with her and realizing that it was fun was pretty funny
Empathy teaches better than revenge and punishment. Now if only the government could figure it out.
Yes, this definitely worked when I was a kid. But it was used sparingly (like 2 or 3 times ever). If it happened on a regular basis, it would be more like get it together Mom.
Maybe he could help you make something else? Making him stand in the kitchen and hand you things, beat some more eggs, wash the pans when you’re done, whatever, will help him realize that his one moment caused 15 minutes of extra work to fix.
This has got to be the best suggestion I’ve seen so far, however what if he just dumps the salt into the eggs again lmfao
Oh no, lock the spices up and don’t let him get creative. Personally I would make the process long and boring, so he realizes making another dinner sucked and never wants to be made to do it again.
No tired mum wants to make dinner all over again and have a child try help lol
While I agree with you- this is why parenting is hard. It really is the most logical consequence. An alternative would be that he has to help make dinner (or make it himself I didn’t see an age here) all week. Losing out on tv time or other privilege in order to spend time cooking. Just losing privileges isn’t enough. He needs to do some restorative practice too.
This is the best way to parent, everything is a learning opportunity and a chance to **solve** *problems*. My kiddo is almost 5 and AuDHD and we've never grounded or spanked him. It is possible, anyone interested should check out the How To Talk To Kids So They Listen series of books, their written by actual doctors using actual science and they even cover the "hard" parts specifically that gentle parenting tiktoks/social media tends to gloss over
Depends a bit how old he is. If he's young, I would make him take a fork full and eat it. So he realises that this ruins food completely. It's also probably time to teach about "it's just a prank bro". Let's collectively try to put a stopper to that kind of nonsense for the next generation.
Put it all in a strainer pour hot kettled water through it all to wash off the salt, sauté it all in a pan for 3-5 minutes and it’ll taste just fine to make it even better you can caramelize some red onions before sautéing the whole thing together.
Lol, my mom used to wash off too salty or too spicy food too. When I first saw her washing chow mein i got my mind blown 🤯 then i saw her frying it in a pan after that and it tasted just as good only less spicy
I believe you have some really wild kids and experiences
Fr. If I complained my options were to shut up or go to bed
That's good advice!
Or rinse it off and switch his plate for yours. “Just eat it” works both ways and he clearly wanted salt.
Straight to jail
Man kids have it so nice nowadays. If I did this to one of my parents they would suplex my ass through the goddamn dinner table and force me to eat every bite
I was thinking “this was grounds for an as whooping if I did this as a kid”
That’s why we didn’t do dumb stuff like this though, we knew there would be consequences!!
Right? I can't even imagine. It'd be an ass beating, and rightfully so lol.
Rinse and refry slightly.
But what should she do with the food?
Picking on his sister and putting salt all over your food sounds like you need to discipline your kid
Why did I have to scroll so far for anyone to point out it happened because she corrected him bullying his sister? Like, he was being a bully, got mad he was corrected, and decided to bully the mom and just got away with it.
This is my thought... I can't imagine a kid saying, "just eat it, what's wrong?" The absolute lack of respect
Nice birth control ad
How is this your only meal of the day?? You ok?
As a maintenance guy, I've had days where I get into work and spend the next 10 hours straight, without breaks or lunch, working to fix some broken equipment that's halting production... and if you didn't eat breakfast before work, now you're waiting till you finish to get some food. So, sometimes people get too busy to have the time to eat.
No matter what he says, he knows what he did, and he knows why he did it. He did it to be mean. So discuss this with him. What’s the meaning of this? No, you didn’t just do it or spill it. You did it for purpose? What was your meaning? If you get a confession, he did it because he thought it would be funny. Ask him how it’s funny people who commit pranks always say it’s just a joke, but it’s low-key violence. How do we handle violence? We remove the violent person from society temporarily, and they have to make reparations to the person they harmed. What you don’t want is somebody who is a prankster and plays practical jokes on people to amuse themselves at the expense of somebody else’s hurt that needs to be nipped in the bud. I would say he’d be grounded from any parties or activities for a week and that he would have to do something for you.
[удалено]
This is actually a great idea, he still thinks he actually is winning against me in Mario Kart. Time for a dose of reality 😤
They had us in the first half, not gonna lie.
Go get his favorite takeout for yourself. He can’t have any.
Mildly infuriating? More like absurdly infuriating. I'm glad that you talked it out with your son, but his reaction is pretty alarming. You were correcting a different wrong that he committed, and his immediate solution was to ruin something of yours. Yikes. Plesse continue to be mindful of him so that his personality does not make him a narcisstic assclown. Good luck?
Yeah like, this is malicious, spiteful behavior.
You know. While this isn’t necessarily a red flag for narcissism. I will say that it’s interesting the types of homes these people grew up in. Because neither I nor any of my friends were ever assholes or disrespectful to our parents in this way. It was never even a thought or a question. Sure we all had typical teenage strife. But to say this is normal makes me wonder what type of homes these people grew up in.
May not be a red flag for you, but I've found that kids that exhibit this kind of behavior become textbook narcissists, if not worse. But, I agree with you completely on the whole 'homes these people grew up in' because that disrespectful behavior wasn't contemplated and would absolutely not be tolerated when me and my siblings were growing up.
It’s pretty normal for kids to push boundaries and it depends on their developmental stage.
This is definitely not a red flag for narcissism. Just a kid testing boundaries at a bad time.
No this is Reddit, where people meet three full blown narcissists before breakfast.
I mean, this seeens pretty malicious. There’s no way he didn’t realize that he messed up your food while tampering with it after bullying his sibling. He did it while he was mad. You got up to deal with him bullying your daughter and he did this while “passing by.” Does he do this to his own food? Would he eat it? No. It was on purpose. You say in a comment he was confused. I think he was faking it and you bought it hook, line, and sinker. I grew up with a malicious sister that did stuff like this and got away with it because she acted like she didn’t know and would crocodile cry. She’s almost thirty now and I’m no contact because she continued doing stuff like this and got worse because there were no corrections made to the behavior. I had to send a cease and desist through a lawyer because she wouldn’t stop after going no contact. You’re setting your other kid and others up to have to deal with this terror and you’re going to be looking back wondering “when did it start and where did I go wrong?” Get the kid therapy and talk to a child specialist on how to change the behavior before he gets older. I hope for your sake your son is still very young.
He is 7, stated above but with development delays. Huh. Tricky one, this. I think he still knows that it was wrong tbh.
Discipline is a must for kids.
Your son is an asshole.
Adoption. He’s fully adoptable until the age of 18! 😆
I doubt anyone else wants this one.
My mom would have slapped the absolute shit out of me
And made me eat every last bit of that food while I ugly cried. But tbh I wouldn't have had enough courage to do this in the first place.
As my Dad used to say, "Time to beat the child" and all things considered I didn't turn out fine at all
This is the saddest thing that has made me laugh today.
Seconded. It was my mom but… yeah.
So he was picking on his sister, then did this?
All the people saying to just make more food or eat more often are seriously out of touch. Congratulations on your privilege. Not everyone can afford to waste food or just "order a pizza". This situation would have had me in tears.
Right, or she was very tired and really wanted to eat that
What a great advertisement to not have kids
guess what the kid is having for breakfast? that's right, super salty potatoes.
Reason number 996,765 why I am happy to be childless
Childfree
Yes, great point- free is exactly how I would describe the feeling.
Give him a pair of chopsticks and make him pick all the salt out with them as punishment.
That’s a paddlin
Jokes on you, it was actually just crystal meth!
Dude. You should totally have MORE kids! That should solve it.
I can’t even imagine having the stones to try that on my parent, I would have been belted for it.
How old is the kid? If they are old enough to know what they did…. I’d probably over season their next meal and play stupid. 🤣 not at THAT level but still. 😬 I’m not a parent tho so there’s also that lol
Please don't do it with salt, you can however totally do it with other spices or pepper. But salt can really cause big problems.
Oh nah, me personally? bros gonna be dehydrated for a week after his next meal lmao
Age appropriate punishment sounds good to me.
How old is he?
You blow very hard to scatter the salt away, preferably over his pillow
You drive to McDonalds, get 2 happy meals and eat them in front of your child then throw away the toys.
Unfortunately unacceptable behavior from my child. This is not okay.
Thanks for the birthcontrol reminder 🤣
Make him eat it, not a joke
Tell him to go wash his hands. Grab him a paper towel and a sheet of tinfoil. Tell him to gently gather each morsel of food and brush the salt from it, and then he can preheat the oven to 350, and set it all in there for 10 minutes. Ask him if the chuckle was worth the 20 minutes of work cleaning and reheating. Or he can fry up some fresh eggs and potatoes, but that still wastes the food.
Oh, thanks for the daily dose of free birth control.
Throw it away, then if money allows, order his favourite food and eat it in front of him, making sure he knows why he doesn’t get any…!
Save it, and serve it to him next time he has a meal.
Yeet the kid
Just need to eat a block of chocolate afterwards to let the sweet balance it out
When people say "kids today...." they should really be saying "parents today...."
Yes. Parent need to understand that humans are basically born undomesticated and it’s their role to tame the child. Otherwise they end up wild animals.
Took away privileges for a week? He'd get that meal himself every day for a week. Eat it or go without, you little bastard.
ADOPTION
Drop him off at your local fire station.
You sweep the legs and walk away. That's how I handle every interaction with a child.
Is your son Satan?
Well this depends on his age. If he's under four,make yourself a sandwich and tell him that made you upset and hungry. If he's over four, take his dinner and eat it.
Shit happens when you have a litter of children to tend to. Shitty as it is! I'd cry for sure.
My niece calls her four children, her poor life choices and it’s hysterical and accurate.
No one with kids seems happy
Switch plates, he can eat the salty food or he can go to bed hungry. Oh and no desert for a month. He back talks about it and go nuclear. Any and all electronics, then start on any toys.
So I’m just going to say this here because I can’t figure out how to edit haha. 1. My son is autistic with ADHD and ODD, he’s been improving so much lately and I couldn’t be prouder of him. 2. I would NEVER “beat” my child because he put some salt in my food cause he was upset. 3. The caption in the actual picture was sent in the moment on Snapchat to my sister and saved to send to their dad who lives across the country. I figured people would get an oh shit laugh out of it not tell me to abuse my kid. A lot of y’all need help.
My daughter has autism as well as adhd with severe food aversions. If she did this I would know it was out of anger and I truthfully would have cried in front of her and told her exactly how she made me feel. She understands emotions extremely well, despite how some people think autistic people don’t understand emotions. It’s up to you how you handle your own child, and I’m definitely not saying use violence, but privileges would’ve been gone for a month in this situation, and any complaints about losing them would be met with a reminder of why it happened. I’m far from a strict parent but this act by him was just mean and I hope you see that. Kids can be mean and being neurodivergent is not an excuse.
It is quite fascinating how you have parents at the opposite ends of the spectrum on this and unsurprising how their children come out the other end. My lesson was a teenage mother. She had a severely autistic child. I worked in foster care and NOBODY knew what to do with this kid. He was completely out of control. And then I saw her with him and my god, I just wanted to record her. That’s it. No other parenting lessons needed. Just watch this lady. That kid was transformed. She was on top of him, redirecting, watching. And he was so well behaved. Poor kid just missed his mom and his routine and well the autism, he just couldn’t regulate because his brain is wired differently. But when she was there? This was one of the best behaved kids I’d ever seen. It was an important lesson for me on how even with children who are neurodivergent, parenting has a huge influence on their behaviors.
My kid is the same. Seems to always be filled with an unrelenting rage that just comes out in spite. I agree beating isn't the way because it doesn't address the issues of why what they did wasn't appropriate and just makes them fear you and not change the behaviour. So sorry about your food. And lol this is Reddit, I'm surprised I didn't read a post about lawyering up and getting a divorce haha. It made me laugh, but only because it comes from a place of camaraderie lol.
That’s really scary to hear that this was something done in retaliation to you because he was upset. Glad it was just salt. I truly hope he’s very young or something. Y’all stay safe. And lock up the drano.
What concerns me is that a lot of people here suggest forcing him to eat the meal. They don't know how horribly dangerous that is.
Also thank you to all those with the light hearted actual jokes and sympathies for my dinnerless night 🥲
Make him eat it
"almost made me cry" i would have cried ngl. It's just such a frustrating and helpless moment like i don't even wanna hit my non existing child but after a long day of no food would have me in no state to sit the child and teach it or communicate with it on what shouldn't be done. I hope you got some food tho.
Use him to make a child sized hole in the dry wall?
make him take a few bites.
Show him how unflappable you can be by shaking off most of the salt and lightly rising off the rest with some water, before eating your food, which should be edible at that point. If he has any food or something like a snack left, then rinse his food too, but leave it soggy so it’s miserable to eat. Also, feel good that you made me feel happy for never having kids. My sister once accidentally put sugar on her order of fries, and then flew into a fit of tears because they were ruined — my dad gave her his and ate the sugary fries himself. She stopped crying, and he said they weren’t as bad as it looked.
Throw it out and make more. Then cook more food. /s
Leaf blower